The Russian-installed leader of Chechnya criticised U.S. police on Friday for killing an ethnic Chechen suspected of carrying out the Boston Marathon bombing and blamed the violence on his upbringing in the United States.

“The root of evil should be looked for in the United States,” Ramzan Kadyrov said in comments posted online after the police shot dead Tamerlan Tsarnaev and hunted for his brother Dzhokhar, his suspected accomplice.

“They (the brothers) grew up and studied in the United States and their attitudes and beliefs were formed there,” Kadyrov said. “Any attempt to make a connection between Chechnya and the Tsarnaevs is in vain.”

Kadyrov, a tough pro-Kremlin leader whose security services have been accused of human rights abuses such as kidnappings and torture, questioned why the U.S. police had not been able to arrest Tamerlan Tsarnaev.

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